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A review by myrtosfullybooked
Sabrina & Corina: Stories by Kali Fajardo-Anstine
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Sabrina & Corina, Kali Fajardo-Anstine πΌπ₯π§
I've decided to stop giving star reviews to story collections because as we all know, each story will be different and some will hit a chord more than others, but for this book, I couldn't resist.
The stories in this collection deal with painful themes like intergenerational violence, abandonment, and discrimination, but they are written gently, and they flow easily. If anything, the writing felt minimal but, just like the women whose stories it portrayed, hid many deeper layers - not all of them meant to or being fully revealed to the reader. I feel like I learned a lot about the experiences of Indigenous and Latina women in the American West without the book ever becoming didactic or compromising the atmosphere of the story told.
Tomi, Any Further West, and Ghost Sickness were my favourites from the collection. Any Further West, especially, felt like a punch in the stomach, but it was so beautifully well-written. I may not be able to explain it very well, but we see characters lost, self-destructive, desperate, or perpetually in pain, and yet somehow what stayed with me was their strength and their survival. The cycles of violence and pain sometimes seem endless and inescapable, but every now and then a daughter will get away and make it; a grandmother will leave a legacy to be honoured; a cousin will be remembered for more than her beauty even if it's by only one person; a lost girl might be found... Normally, these would have been the type of stories I would have found so grim and depressing, and I was really surprised to find myself not wanting the book to end. It is all the things sad girl literature (or the samples of it I've read at least) is trying to be and fails.
I am so grateful to @bouebooks for putting this book on my radar. I will certainly be reading Woman of Light too.
I've decided to stop giving star reviews to story collections because as we all know, each story will be different and some will hit a chord more than others, but for this book, I couldn't resist.
The stories in this collection deal with painful themes like intergenerational violence, abandonment, and discrimination, but they are written gently, and they flow easily. If anything, the writing felt minimal but, just like the women whose stories it portrayed, hid many deeper layers - not all of them meant to or being fully revealed to the reader. I feel like I learned a lot about the experiences of Indigenous and Latina women in the American West without the book ever becoming didactic or compromising the atmosphere of the story told.
Tomi, Any Further West, and Ghost Sickness were my favourites from the collection. Any Further West, especially, felt like a punch in the stomach, but it was so beautifully well-written. I may not be able to explain it very well, but we see characters lost, self-destructive, desperate, or perpetually in pain, and yet somehow what stayed with me was their strength and their survival. The cycles of violence and pain sometimes seem endless and inescapable, but every now and then a daughter will get away and make it; a grandmother will leave a legacy to be honoured; a cousin will be remembered for more than her beauty even if it's by only one person; a lost girl might be found... Normally, these would have been the type of stories I would have found so grim and depressing, and I was really surprised to find myself not wanting the book to end. It is all the things sad girl literature (or the samples of it I've read at least) is trying to be and fails.
I am so grateful to @bouebooks for putting this book on my radar. I will certainly be reading Woman of Light too.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Abandonment, Colonisation, Abortion, Alcoholism, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Racism, and Sexual violence